The Duke of Caxias
Last weekend we had a really good lunch out with friends at a local fish restaurant. Not only was the food very good and the restaurant very pleasant, but the conversation was very stimulating as we spent a lot of time discussing the history of Rio Grande do Sul and the daring and brave exploits of the Gauchos who fought the Spanish and Portuguese to keep control of their lands, despite being hugely outnumbered.

In fact Rio Grande do Sul was the site of many battles in the 1800s and a key figure in this history was the Duke of Caxias, a renowned Brazilian military leader, who is particularly remembered for his leadership in the War of The Triple Alliance, in which Paraguay took on the might of the triple alliance of Brazil, Uraguay and Argentina. According to the Wikipedia site, 1 million died in this war.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luís_Alves_de_Lima_e_Silva

The interesting thing about this site is that The Duke of Caxias is written up in glowing terms, whereas according to our friends he was a brutal leader and the story goes that he poisoned the dead and threw them into the rivers, so that his enemies would have a poisoned water supply. Whether this is true or not, who can say, but as always, the history 'books' are written by the 'glorious' conquerors!

However, once you start reading some of the information on the internet it becomes very clear that southern Brazil has a very rich and fascinating history.